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TV review: Little Women

The Call the Midwife writer Heidi Thomas bravely took on a classic, but her Little Women reminded us why we loved the novel in the first place

Little WomenBBC One★★★★★

The Miniaturist BBC One★★★☆☆

It was brave to take on Little Women, Louisa May Alcott’s story of the March sisters. I was nervous — it’s a favourite and I watch the 1994 film, with Winona Ryder as the fiery tomboy Josephine, at least once a year. Happily, as with the best cover versions, the writer Heidi Thomas (Call the Midwife, Cranford) reminds us why we love it and shows us the classic in a bright new light. It was not the middlebrow soup I had worried it might be.

Emily Watson plays the March family matriarch in Little WomenPATRICK REDMOND/PLAYGROUND/BBC

Jo (Maya Hawke, Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman’s daughter) is a revelation in her first TV role, playing the free spirit as a slightly geeky 15-year-old — especially around neighbour Laurie Laurence (Jonah Hauer-King,…

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